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Fans around the world are most familiar with TJ Klune's stories on the printed page, from the award-winning fantasy of 2020's The House in the Cerulean Sea to the 2022 queer love story Under The Whispering Door. Fans in attendance of the author's spotlight panel recently at Chicago's C2E2 were treated to a different kind of story: Klune's ongoing saga of revenge against a rude, bigoted neighbor.

The prolific fantasy author - who describes himself as 'very, very homosexual" to great applause from the crowd of fans - said he lives in a small town outside of Washington D.C. where a handyman informed him that Klune's downhill neighbor asked, "What's that [homophobic slur] doing up there?" 

Not one to simply take such bigoted cruelty, Klune found the neighbor's realtor and publicly asked him on Instagram "Why do you rent to homophobic people?" Not wanting to appear complicit, the landlord quickly called Klune to smooth things over, and Klune requested a face-to-face apology from the bigoted neighbor… which the neighbor refused, suddenly wishing to let bygones be bygones.

Down the line, the original landlord returned and asked Klune the question to truly escalate his revenge: "Would you like to buy the house?" Klune proceeded to buy all the land surrounding the bigot's house, effectively becoming his accidental landlord.

Somehow, the escalation was not over. Later on, Klune was walking his dog past the home in question, and an older gentleman standing outside asked him if he was "that author fella." Although the older man couldn't get through his book "because of all the antichrist," the man - revealed to be the bigot's father - apologized on his son's behalf, and told Klune his son was a fool. At which point a lightbulb went off: "I'm gonna get the ultimate revenge. I'm gonna fuck his dad," said Klune gleefully.

Where the revenge goes from here seems a bit more private. Or perhaps we'll see elements in Klune's "painful" next novel.

Just like yourself, the Popverse staff spends a whole lot of time with our respective noses in respective books. It's why we've come up with stuff like:

• The hottest upcoming fiction
• Queer romance to add to your reading list
• A reading guide to Cassandar Clare's Shadowhunter Chronicles

...and a whole lot more. Join our metaphorical library, won't you? There are no late fees and you can be as loud as you want, so long as the people you live with are OK with it.